Opening Thursday, May 31st from 6-10 pm. Exhibition continues on June 1-3 from 12 noon-5 pm. Location: The Burroughes building 639 queen street west. Some of the photographers (like Jamal Shabazz) will be in a attendance.

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The Arts Now is a weekly podcast about the Toronto arts scene hosted by Ella Cooper and Amil Niazi.

This sampling of eclectic images, regardless of whether or not they individualy demonstrate the Contact festival's "constructed image" theme, do collectively form a unique "constructed image" of our thriving city, through the eyes and words of our readers and Flickr pool members.

Comments and questions for or by the photographers are always welcome!

Links to full-sized images after the jump...

Though the exhibition does not actually include Robarts Library, Mid-Century Icons still offers an eclectic and definitely nostalgic look into the modernist boom of not only Toronto, but urban Canada as a whole.

These images were recently submitted to the blogTO Flickr pool. The people that took the photographs have been invited to participate in discussions about them here. Anyone can start! Don't be shy!

Here are some general starter questions for all nine photographers:

Where/when was it taken?
Is there a story within or about your photograph?

1. The Death of Spiderman by Word Freak
2. NMS Nathan Phillips Square Pillow Fight 54.jpg by JaMmCat
3. Polly Esther vs Lynn Somnia by mikeghenu
4. Oh Canada! by kompot.photo
5. photojunkie much? by tanjatiziana
6. Brian With Joint by danepstein
7. Such Great Heights by MCXL5
8. sakura at sunset by syncros
9. Untitled by forever_7887

Although it's a group show with contributions from Talia Shipman, Luna Simic, Claudio Bianchi, Che Kothari and Sammy Rawal, the photos that really grabbed me were from local, self-taught digital photographer Tobias Wang.

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Here's a tribute to the makeshift signs all around us. Many are humourous, others are serious, but all of them came from the cameras of blogTO readers that submitted them to the blogTO Flickr pool over the last few months. Thanks, as always for your submissions, everyone!

1.Truth in advertising 2.Church Excuse 3.Free Rolling Papers 4....we do want we want

5.freestyle graffiti? 6.then what's graffiti 7.Love Behind Bars 8.Stop driving

9.IMG_8601.JPG 10.Untitled 11.important balls 12.Stoop and scoop, please.

13.smurfiliciously dangerous 14.must be time for pie ... 15.no buy no hope 16.Red door

Playing off of this year's theme of The Constructed Image, Coupland combines photos of Japanese ikebana arrangements with military iconography to create these almost hypnotic combinations of line and plane. The symbols are inspired by decals from plastic model airplane kits, and this childlike and obviously playful sentiment comes through, like most of Coupland's work, quite strongly.

The flower arrangements are from the rikka school of ikebana, which is supposed to be the most challenging of all styles. Coupland explains that, "the contradiction of rikka is that an extraordinary amount of artifice is used to create a natural aesthetic. They evoke landscape but they're about as natural as microwave ovens." A large part of what I love about Coupland's work (and of course his writing) is the subtle irony he always manages to implant in a way that never seems forced, but always very necessary.

At the end of the day, I suppose they are just simply posters on bus shelters. But he has stated that this series is about as close to self-portraiture as he's ever come, so please forgive this rather obvious fan for perhaps diving a little deeper than necessary into the meaning behind Warflowers. I tend to get carried away with the things I love.

Also on this week's podcast:
*Executive director, Scott Ferguson tells me what's to come at this year's Inside Out
* Movie reviews for Waitress and 28 Weeks Later

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May 11th (Tonight!)

Tonight is all about Ossington or just off Ossington. My first stop will be Gallery TPW where Winnipeg artist Dominique Ray's Selling Venus / Venus au miroir presents a portrait of exotic dancers, and of the artist herself taking on the role of a stripper, at the Crazy Horse dance club in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. I stopped by the gallery yesterday for a preview and I have to say it's the best put together exhibit I've seen in the new TPW space yet.

This sampling of eclectic images, regardless of whether or not they themselves demonstrate the Contact festival's "constructed image" theme, do collectively form a unique "constructed image" of our thriving city, through the eyes and words of our readers and Flickr pool members.

Please continue for full-sized images and words from the photographers...

In January of this year, they handed out 22 disposable cameras to men, women and children living is Southern Sudan with the intent that each of them document their lives. Speaking with Krista yesterday, she mentioned how she tought participants (comprised of child soldiers, former slaves, nurses, teachers and school children) how to use the cameras and then quickly need to moderate their enthusiasm so they wouldn't take all the allocated photos (there were 27 on each camera) at once.

Luckily, you still have a chance to witness Seaton's exhibit: part of this year's Contact Photography Festival, SexeS will be on display at the Renaissance Cafe until the end of the month, and I highly recommend that you make the trip down the Danforth to check it out. I recently had the chance to ask the prolific Toronto area photographer a few questions about the exhibit, 'contructed' photography, and this year's festival.

I've been to many of the places represented in her series and (to be candid) it's rather incredible how meaningful, and memory-provoking something as simple as a mound of dirt can be. The rich colour and texture of "Cu Chi" depicted here takes me back to the tunnels of Cu Chi, where my guide told me war stories and where I learned of the intricacies of the tunnels' role in the battles.

Nguyen also presents Postcards of Vietnam - a series of photographs shot in various war museums that in lieu of portraying the conventional picture perfect tourist postcard images, depicts the remnants of war past.

Gallery 44
401 Richmond St W, Ste 120
May 5 - June 2
Tue - Sat, 11am - 5pm